“You cannot do everything as a general manager, so you have to make sure there is a structure that empowers the team and the people around you. The great thing about being a Hilton hotel is that Hilton gives us great tools to develop our team members.
“We have a series of programmes — I’ve done most of them as well — to make sure that we hire the right people and that people have the right talent and training,” Elwahidi asserts.
“Opening a hotel is not easy and one of the keys to success is having the right people; people who went through the ‘Shine’ programme [a Hilton training programme designed for department heads to progress to a director level], or management training programmes.
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“Once you have the right team, the company supports the organisation of work. We have a tool that gives a list of tasks that have to be done in each department and by each person, and this is done in coordination with the team.”
The training process follows a three-step programme, where the team first watches the trainer perform a task, followed by the staff and trainer working on a task together.
Finally, the staff member performs the job with the trainer observing and offering feedback — a process that Elwahidi believes is extremely effective.
It’s also clear that employee welfare and talent development among the staff are priorities for Elwahidi, who says it’s important to stick to allocated working hours.
“We are very particular about working hours. If I’m a room attendant, I should get no more than ‘x’ number of rooms, which is the industry standard.
“There are hotels even in this area, where you are given far more rooms to clean in a working day, and then you tend to work extra hours, but you don’t get paid overtime, you are not given your hours back in lieu.
“Another thing is meals. We have three buffet meals, seven days a week and this is closely monitored. We pay a higher price than most hotels and this is just to make sure that the meals produced for our team are of better quality than average.”
The attention paid to staff seems to have paid off in terms of customer service. A look through the hotel’s TripAdvisor page shows only positive feedback about team members, with staff being lauded for their intuitive service.
“We went through an extensive selection process. We handpicked people based on the fact that we saw potential in them. We believe in retaining people with high potential, where they go through succession planning, which is very motivating. It’s a newly opened hotel, and you can already see promotions and transfers taking place. This is very encouraging and it motivates people to stay with our hotel,” Elwahidi enthuses.
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